Betrothed
by udderpd
Summary: Harry has delusions about having a quiet seventeenth birthday.


**Disclaimer**: J. K. Rowling owns the Harry Potter Universe all other claimants to anything to do with the H.P. story are simply hangers on to her glory. I thank her for allowing us mere mortals to play in her world and I promise that while I have Harry in my care nothing bad will happen to him. I will leave that to J.K.R. herself in her books.

**Authors Note**; This bit of Fluff occurs on Harry's seventeenth birthday and ignores most year six canon especially that concerning depression, Voldemort and soul splitting.

**Betrothed. **

It was Harry Potter's seventeenth birthday and he was quite happily ensconced in Grimmauld Place, he had been there about a week and he had been clothes shopping three times. Remus, who he had also forced to buy a lot of new clothes, was somewhat amazed because in both wizarding and Muggle shops he seemed to always get some pretty girl to help him with both the style and the colour of what he was buying.

Moreover although it was still ten minutes before seven in the morning he was sitting at the large table in the kitchen thinking that he would have a nice quiet day.

All that of course was before the post owl came from the Ministry.

"Remus!" Harry yelled and there was a note of panic in his voice. "What on earth is this all about?"

Remus hurried into the kitchen at number twelve and quickly sat beside Harry. "What is it he asked?" accepting the letter from Harry and reading it.

**From the Registry of Births, Deaths, Marriages and Betrothals.**

_Dear Mr Potter,_

_It is with greatest of pleasure that I write to inform you that a gathering has been arranged in conference room seven of the Ministry of Magic._

_It is scheduled to begin at three o'clock this afternoon, between yourself and four of your six betrothed. (The other two young ladies are still under the age of majority therefore they have not been informed of this meeting.)_

_Heartiest Felicitations,_

_Isolonte Pumpernickel._ (Registrar.)

**This letter will function as a Portkey fifteen minutes before the assembly is due to commence.**

Remus had turned grey, "I remember that when the marauders joined the order and your mother became pregnant, several of the other members wives were expecting as well and your dad sort of got into the habit of saying to lots of people, _'If your wife has a girl maybe she could get together with our child if it is a boy.'_

"I know that there is a book in the Ministry, sort of like the name book at Hogwarts but this one records betrothals and the law allowing a wizard to have more than one wife is ancient and I know that it has never been repealed.

"Unfortunately James' sense of humour seems to have backfired on you."

"Brilliant! Lots of things seem to backfire on me. What on earth can I do?" Harry had his head in his hands.

"I will call Tonks and see if she knows anything that you can do." Remus called Tonks on the Floo and after he had explained Harry's problem to her she told him that she would call them back within fifteen minutes.

A short time later Tonks called back to tell them that she couldn't find out anything.

Harry was starting to lose patients so he grabbed his letter a headed towards the back door.

"Where do you think that you are going?" Remus asked starting to panic.

"I am going to ask the font of all wisdom and knowledge about it." Harry replied slamming the back door behind him as he went out.

The werewolf rushed out of the back door but Harry had already disappeared.

"BLAST the boy! He doesn't even know where Hermione lives." Remus muttered before panicking properly.

XxX

With a crack Harry arrived in what was evidently a girl's bedroom, he was standing outside a door that was ajar and there was the sound of a shower running.

Above the noise of the shower was the sound of Hermione starting to panic so Harry called, "Hermione don't worry!

"It's only me.

"Harry.

"Please don't be afraid."

There was a noise that sounded like 'Lawks! Harrumph!' and the bathroom door slammed shut.

Three minutes later Hermione came storming out of her bathroom wrapped in a towel with another one around her hair, she pointed at the other door in her bedroom and said, "Go out into the hall and wait for me to get dressed."

"But…"

"Get out in the hall!" it was a tone that she only ever normally used when she was arguing with Ron or ready to punch Draco, it was evident that she was not too happy with him, at the moment.

"Yes dear." He said like a well-trained husband as he went out into the hall to wait.

She had finished dressing and dried her hair using a charm so she opened her bedroom door and snapped, "Harry it's not even eight o'clock in the morning, what on earth are you doing here?"

Handing her the letter and looking at her sheepishly he said, "I received this nearly an hour ago. So I panicked and decided to ask whether you knew if there was anything I could do about it?"

She had read the letter and her whole demeanour softened, he really did have a problem so she took his hand and led him down stairs to a sofa in the lounge.

Something suddenly occurred to her, "You don't know where I live so how did you get here?"

He looked down sheepishly and said, "When we were learning to Apparate they told us something about if you knew someone really well you could Apparate directly too them.

"So I just did.

"So where are we then?"

The bookworm turned scarlet. What they had actually been told was that if you were in love with someone and it was an emergency concerning them, then it might be possible to Apparate directly to them. She knew that Ron had been trying to talk to him about Quidditch at the time and he had not been listening to the lecture properly.

Hermione Jane was not slow, he probably didn't know it himself, but Harry Potter was in love with her.

Suddenly she had a very pleasant warm glow all over.

"We are in the south-western outskirts of Bromley," she answered, "twenty odd miles from the middle of London and around thirty-five from Little Whinging. We have nearly visited you several times but Professor Dumbledore had always stopped us. If you had still been there this summer no-one would have stopped us visiting you regularly."

Again he looked down, "So do you know anything I can do about this letter then?"

"Last February Padma was panicking in the library," he did not see how Padma panicking in the library had anything to do with his current predicament but Hermione already appeared to be quite cross with him so he thought it best to let her carry on anyway, "and her problem was that she wanted to become engaged and being pureblood her engagement was automatically registered with this department of the Ministry.

"That woman registrar told her that she couldn't get engaged because she was already betrothed, they wouldn't tell her who to and her parents didn't seem to have any idea either.

"So, whilst we were trying to find a way out of her predicament, we dug through all of the books we could find on the subject and I think that we found out just about everything because we had several other girls helping as well.

"Basically unless you are engaged at the time that you find out who these girls are and it would have to be to a Muggle or Muggle-born witch, there is nothing that you can do about it. If you tried to become engaged to even a half blood then you would have the same problem that Padma had when the engagement tried to register in the girl's name it would have been rejected.

"If you are engaged the pair of you can reject up to half of the girls because you do not believe that you are compatible and the mere fact that you do not know the girls is not an excuse. These are all very old laws and they should all be struck off but they probably suit the rich old pure blood families who want to keep the money in the family, so to speak."

Harry was looking straight into her eyes. "There is only one girl that I have ever thought that I would like to marry and she is a Muggle born witch but she seems to like Ron Weasley."

Hermione did not look away, "Maybe she was looking at Ron because Harry 'clueless' Potter never gave her any hint that he liked her as anything other than a best friend."

Years later he would confess that he had absolutely no idea how it happened but he simply asked, "Hermione will you marry me?"

She had never even kissed a boy properly but she knew that this was her destiny and she answered, "Yes, of course I will Harry."

So then they kissed.

When their lips parted there was a burst of phoenix song and a flash of golden light caused by the appearance of a brilliant-white phoenix. The beautiful bird dropped Harry's mother's engagement ring into his hand and disappeared, so he placed the ring onto the third finger of her left hand.

Before they could kiss again Hermione's parents arrived with Remus and Tonks, her mother anxiously enquired, "We saw a flash of golden light, what was it?"

Hermione had a huge smile on her face as she replied, "It was a wonderful white phoenix which delivered Harry's mum's engagement ring when I agreed to marry him."

Tonks' knees gave out and she collapsed into a chair, "Wow!"

"What's the matter?" Hermione's father asked.

"Oh, nothing is the matter as such." Tonks was grinning like a Cheshire cat. "The white Phoenix is called Eros and he only appears once in every several hundred years or so, the story is told to little witches as a bedtime story and personally I always thought that it was just a fairy tale.

"Ultimately romantic." Tonks mumbled, she just couldn't get over it.

"Couldn't you of waited a day or two?" her father asked.

"Unfortunately we have to go to a meeting this afternoon and this had to be done before then." Hermione was still very excited. "I suppose that I will have to dress up for the meeting in the ministry, will you come back for me please darling?"

"Hang on just a minute," Remus said, "perhaps you should read this before you start making too many plans, it came from Gringotts just after you left to come here. How did you get here anyway you didn't know where Hermione lived?"

Whilst Harry was reading his letter from the wizarding bank Hermione explained how Harry had managed to Apparate directly to her.

The weather was nice out and the new couple were both wearing Jeans, trainers and T-shirts so Harry passed his love the letter and suggested, "It is only about nine thirty so I think perhaps we should go to Gringotts first, then you come back here to explain everything to your parents and get ready. I will go home and change into some robes and come back here at about two to half past, how does all of that sound?"

Promising her parents that she would explain everything when she returned she stood up to go to the bank with her fiancé.

XxX

Tonks explained that they were aiming to Apparate to the area to the right of the steps leading up to the bank, so Remus and Tonks Apparated to the bank with the pair.

When they entered the bank Harry showed one of the tellers the letter and told him that he had come to see the head banker Gringott as the letter had requested. The goblin went and passed the message on so within a very short time they were all shown into the office of the Head of the bank because as Tonks had already explained. 'Cor blimey Harry with a name like that who on earth do you think he is?'

After greeting the four of them the banker asked Harry if he had any objections to any of the three knowing an outline of his financial affairs, when Harry said that he didn't mind the goblin explained Harry's situation to him.

He was surprised that he still had about a quarter of a million Galleons in his school vault and Sirius' Will had added another vault containing over half a million in cash and fourteen million in various shares, bonds and some deeds for commercial properties.

It appeared that because of Sirius' Will, he now owned most of Knockturn Alley, seven shops in Diagon Alley together with the Hogs Head pub and a large shop in Hogsmeade.

His parents Wills had been read many years previously but only now on his seventeenth birthday he had come into the second part of his inheritance. The numbers were almost meaningless; about six million in cash, over thirty million in shares and similar things along with five residential properties including a fifty square mile island which was about a hundred miles north west of Barbados. In addition to all of this were the contents of both the Black and the Potter family vaults; these apart from anything else would contain the family jewellery from both of the ancient families.

The total was something to hear and forget about, he was worth over fifty million Galleons and the only account in the bank that was larger than his was that of the Ministry.

It also became apparent that he now had two titles and four seats in the Wizengamot. 'Marquess Black of Rutland' was one title and 'the Duke of Monmouth' was the other.

The Wizengamot seats were allocated to the family names of Black, Potter, Gryffindor and Emrys, when he enquired he was told that Emrys was the family name of Merlin. As verification of this he was given the four family rings and it was explained that each ring was a pass to a seat on the Wizengamot.

At this stage the banker took pity on them all and decided that they had heard sufficient to be going on with and he passed Harry two summary sheets a short one and a slightly more comprehensive one. Harry also received a thick folder that contained details of all of his assets and a two-inch deep silver coloured metal box that was about twelve inches by four.

Harry glanced at the short summary sheet and passed it to Hermione for her and her parents to look at whilst she was getting ready to come with him later, the more detailed list he tucked into the front of the thick folder.

All of them said goodbye to Gringott and as the party were passing through the banking hall they decided that they would first all go back to Hermione's house.

XxX

It took the four adults twenty minutes to persuade Hermione and Harry to stop kissing and another five before they managed to get him to return home to twelve Grimmauld Place. Hermione's dad had to return to work so she spent her time getting ready to go, eating lunch and at the same time explaining to her mum what was going on also what had been said in the bank.

Harry had a much easier time of it; he wasn't particularly worried about the other girls, whoever they were, he only had to change from his T-shirt and jeans into his best robes. He would make the token gesture of combing his hair but he knew that it wouldn't make any difference. It was a certified mess.

The three of them were sitting at the table in the kitchen when, Harry said, "Remus?"

"Yes Harry."

"I know about house elves and things but should someone in my kind of position have someone to help him look after his affairs?"

Remus gave the question a little thought and said, "Yes, I think that you should."

"I know that you don't need a job," Harry said, "but would you do it for me?"

"Yes I will." The werewolf answered, "So I suppose you want to talk about paying me now?"

"If I was to ask you how much you wanted to be paid you would say that you didn't want anything, wouldn't you?"

"Yes," said Remus looking confused.

"So that is why I was going to talk to Tonks about it later." The young metamorphmagus fell off her chair laughing, Remus looked hard done by and Harry just sat there looking smug.

"So Tonks," Harry said when she had recovered from her laughter, "the Aurors don't appear to be keeping you very busy?"

She didn't look too happy, "Scrimgeour promoted his nephew from Junior Auror to head up the department and it should have gone to Kingsley so a whole bunch of us resigned. I'm lucky that I had just received half a million Galleons from Sirius but I think that things are a bit tight for Kings', he has a wife and two little ones."

"Would you like a job similar to Remus'?" Harry asked. "Also, not necessarily today, could you contact Kingsley for me and see if he would like to be my head of security and training. I would pay both of you whatever the Aurors were paying you and we can work out what to pay our furry friend based on that."

"Yes I would love to work for you." Tonks said smiling, "I am sure that Kings will as well but as you say I think that we will be a bit too busy for me to see him today. I will send him a short note to come here tomorrow morning about a job, that should cheer him up."

It was still about an hour before lunch so he decided to look in the metal box, he took out his wand to cast the opening spell but when it touched the box the lid swung open. The box was divided into five, colour coded, sections and each section contained a bag of the corresponding colour and a small matching colour parchment scroll fixed inside the lid of the box was a short notice:

_Each of the bags contains a wand touch Portkey to the property described on its accompanying parchment; they can only be activated by a Potter. _

_It is recommended that if you are unfamiliar with your heritage that you visit Fairy Hill House first, there you will find much of our history. _

_Please be aware that all of the Potter house elves are free and all five of the properties are unplotable._

The note was not signed.

He took the scroll out of the first section, it was titled: Fairy Hill House – Fairy Hill – the Gower – S. Wales.

This is a large house set within four square miles of grounds.

The ground floor has about a dozen reception rooms.

The first and second floors each have thirty en-suit bedrooms although the staff can vary the number and the size of all of the rooms in the house.

The fourth floor has the elf quarters, some store rooms, a fitness room and a large room that could be used for training.

It should also be noted that the roof is quite interesting and the house also has two levels of cellars. 

"By the look of this you Remus and Kingsley with his family could all live here if you wanted to." Harry said casually as he passed the scroll to Tonks.

He took the scroll out of the second section, it was titled: Godric's Cottage – Godric's Hollow – Brecon – S. Wales.

This is a four bedroom Tudor house that has been rebuilt since Halloween 1981.

You should improve this description after you have visited the cottage.

Having replaced the second scroll he took the scroll out from the third section, it was titled:

Chateau Lilly – Nr Narbonne – Southern France.

Chateau Lilly is identical to Fairy Hill House apart from the fact that it is set within twenty-five square kilometres of what are mainly very fine vineyards.

Harry was getting bored but the next scroll told him something slightly different:

Witchery Nook – N Island – New Zeeland.

This is a ten-bedroom summerhouse, it has been designed as somewhere to go and laze by a pool in the sun when it is hurricane season in the Caribbean or mid winter in Britain.

Finally he reached the last scroll and read. Potter Island – rum plantation.

The thirty-bedroom colonial style house is situated in a sheltered bay on the west side of the island and it suffers from indescribably beautiful sunsets.

The fifty square mile island is twelve miles long and the house is situated about a mile north of the southern tip. Luckily there is a minor magical rift towards the centre of the island and it is used to power everything including a huge desalination plant, which is mainly used for watering the sugar cane and the sugar makes the rum.

Some of the houses he really wanted to visit others he was neither here nor there about.

He had eaten his lunch and reread his list of assets, twice. So the three of them went to get ready to go to the gathering and meet Hermione again.

Harry had slipped the Fairy Hill House Portkey into his pocket, it looked like a two inch diameter gold curtain ring with a looped six foot long red ribbon attached to it.

When the three of them were ready, Tonks had heard Remus say eventually and the result for him wasn't pretty, it was only ten to two so they went to the Grangers house early.

Hermione was ready when they arrived so after chatting for a couple of minutes it was decided that Remus and Tonks should go on ahead and enquire whether it would be possible to have the two younger girls at the gathering.

Harry and his love sat talking with her mother about the houses he had been reading about and at quarter to three the Portkey whisked them away to conference room seven in the Ministry.

XxX

The couple arrived in one corner of the conference room where they were met by Remus and Tonks who told them that, "Her ladyship Mme Pumpernickel has sent two people to see if the other two girls wish to attend the gathering, and she wasn't very happy about it."

A short plump witch came waddling over and haughtily asked, "Who are you young lady?"

"My name is Hermione Granger and I am the fiancé of Harry Potter, Duke of Monmouth. So whom do I have the…honour of addressing?" the bushy haired witch had answered in exactly the same manner as she had been asked except her accent was natural not forced, as had been the case with the plump witch.

The podgy one tried to save face, "My name is Isolonte Pumpernickel and I am the registrar who called this gathering and I believe that you have no place here."

Before Hermione could answer five Portkeys started to arrive at fifteen-second intervals.

The first to arrive was Lavender Brown with her parents. When she saw that it was Harry she was betrothed to she started grinning.

Next came Susan Bones and Hannah Abbot with Hannah's parents. Susan looked quite happy but poor Hannah was crying uncontrollably. The four of them remained at the side of the room with Susan comforting Hannah.

Then Daphne Greengrass arrived also with her parents. The extremely attractive tall Slytherin witch was looking imperious until she realised that Hermione was there with the only single male and it was Harry Potter. Her whole attitude brightened up and she came over and was greeted by Harry then she started to talk with Hermione.

After Daphne the Patil twins arrived with their parents. Parvati looked annoyed and when she saw that the boy was Harry her expression became furious, Padma on the other hand looked resigned until she saw Hermione talking to Daphne and Harry the pretty girl started smiling and went over to join them.

Finally came the largest group it comprised Luna Lovegood with a man who Harry thought was her father and Ginny Weasley with her parents. Luna looked as disconnected as usual and drifted over to the three girls who were talking however as soon as Ginny saw that it was Harry she rushed over and threw her arms around his neck starting to kiss him.

Things were not going quite as Pumpernickel had intended there was one girl who looked ready to commit murder, another was bawling her eyes out and a third who was trying to remove the wizards tonsils with her tongue. She would sort out the bushy haired madam first, "As I told you earlier, you have no place here and I…"

"Whom do you think you are addressing you fat old bat?" Daphne was suddenly back to her imperious best, "This is the brilliant Hermione Granger a Muggle born witch and the Duke of Monmouth's fiancé. Of course she is entitled to be here, or don't you know your own rules?"

"Rule twenty-three I do believe," Padma added, "it states, 'If the wizard is engaged to a Muggle or a Muggle born witch prior to knowing the identity of the witch or witches he is betrothed to then the engagement is deemed valid'. Also it says that 'in the event of there being more than one witch the couple has the right to reject up to half of the girls if they believe that they are not compatible with the rest of the group'."

The parents had all stopped talking to listen to these seventeen year old witches destroy a Ministry flunky.

However Isolonte had one more card to play, "Of course I know the rules it had just slipped my mind for a minute. So are all of you girls virgins?"

Parvati's face suddenly brightened up, she was obviously thinking that she was extremely lucky not to have been asked that question in public but worse in front of her parents.

Lavender's face however fell, she had to publicly admit that she wasn't a virgin and both her and her parents were devastated. The bookworm went over to comfort Lavender and the blond whispered to her that it had been Ron who had taken her virginity and she still loved him. Hermione whispered back that they would try to sort Ron out later.

Next Hermione said quietly to Ginny, "If you want your mum to give you a bit more freedom and start treating you more like an adult then you should start acting like one. Stop hanging all over Harry."

Ginny saw the sense in what her friend had said and quietly left Harry's side and moved over to talk with the rest of the girls.

Harry called, "Susan, Hannah come and talk."

"Hi Harry and everyone," Susan said brightly.

Hermione was looking at Hannah sadly, "I believe that I know the answer but what's the problem Hannah?"

Hannah sniffed, "I think that you all know that I am in love with Neville Longbottom and although I like you all as friends I won't be happy without him."

"So how do you feel about all of this Susan?" Harry asked.

With a small smile the blond witch replied, "My father made a betrothal agreement with yours and I will be very happy to keep the agreement."

Next he asked Daphne the same question and she replied, "In Slytherin I am known as the 'ice queen' because I wouldn't have anything to do with any of the boys, well you all know the boys we are talking about but I am very happy with this arrangement."

He looked at Padma she simply beamed a smile at him and said, "Pretty please."

"Luna?" he asked.

For once she seemed to be on the same planet as everyone else and she answered, "It would make me very happy."

Hermione smirked, "We have left you until last Ginny to give you time to decide if you really want to be involved in this cohort of witches."

The young red head had her back to her mum so she poked her tongue out at Hermione and said, "You can bet your sweet life I do."

"Miss Abbot has been rejected on the grounds that she is not compatible with ourselves." Hermione said after the group had moved over to the adults.

"Apparently," Tonks said glaring at the fat Ministry lackey, "there is a whole gaggle of reporters outside the door."

Harry looked livid, "If one word of this gets printed in any paper we promise to get you before Voldemort get any of us." He cast a silent locking spell on the door and Tonks followed it with two more locking spells and a silencing spell.

"Right, let us go somewhere we can talk in peace." He took the Portkey out of his pocket and the betrothal group as well as the Abbots and Browns took hold of it. Harry touched it with his wand and they all floated away and landed gently in the entry hall of what was obviously a very large house.

XxX

There was a series of pops and a group of a dozen or so house elves were standing, defensively in the inner hall.

The tallest house elf Harry had ever seen suddenly smiled and said, "Rejoice everyone master Harry has returned."

Hermione looked like she was instantly starting to steam, "What are you doing Harry Potter with a dozen elf slaves?"

"Master Harry James Potter has thirty ors might bees forty house elves and we is not slaves we is free elves Miss who is Mr Harry Potter's friend," The tall elf told Hermione, "and we is owed wages for twelve over years."

"At a Galleon a week that is something over ten-thousand Galleons." Padma said quietly and neither Hermione nor Harry batted an eyelid.

"Let's start again shall we." Harry said smiling at the elves, "As you seem to know, my name is Harry Potter, I would like you all to call me Harry and I am glad to be back in my family home." Harry carried on introducing all of the people who had arrived with him and gradually explaining each of their reasons for being there.

The tall elf smiled back at Harry and said, "Welcome home master, my name is Jemma and I is your chief elf and this is Mitsy she is my assistant chief elf, those two are Mimi and Emmy they is ladies maids for the ladies hairs and things, she is Suria the cook and her name is Jiffs she is the Librarian and his name is Memo he makes the Muggle things work." Jemma had been pointing to the elves as she had been introducing them and she continued. "That is enough for now, I will makes them alls wear name tags so you alls know who they is." Then she sent all of the other elves back to their work except for Mitsy who waited patiently with her.

"So you alls needs to talk of much things, so you should alls come too the family room and I is taking Master Harry and Mistress Hermione to his study to makes house work proper for new masters and elves."

It had only taken a few minutes for Harry to claim the house thereby resetting the house wards to his ownership. Memorising the instructions for modifying the Floo and Apparation wards to enable his friends to visit them only took a few minutes. The resetting for each individual would have to be done from the smaller outer hall where they had all arrived earlier in the day.

Hermione had already tried to use her mobile in the house and failed and when she had explained this to Jemma she called Memo. He took both her and Harry's mobiles and told them that it would take a couple of hours to have them both working everywhere, including Hogwarts. Now Hermione had found a telephone in the master study and she had forgone the joy of looking at all of the books and she had telephoned her parents. She asked Harry and he agreed that they would go and bring her parents to the house.

Ten minutes later Hermione was introducing her parents to everyone in the family room. So far the two dentists had been amazed by the Portkey ride, by Harry's house, by house elves and obviously there was more to come.

Harry noticed that Lavender and Parvati were chatting with Hannah also the Brown's were talking with the Abbot's, everyone else seemed to be talking about a wedding except Susan. She was stood slightly back looking a bit sad so Harry went over to her and quietly asked her what the problem was?

"Well they're all talking about a wedding," Susan answered, "and they all have someone to help them, but I am all alone, I have no-one to help me."

He thought for a minute and said, "Why don't you ask Hannah's mum to help you, I am sure that she would like to be involved."

Susan said, "You're brilliant!" and kissed him on the cheek, she turned scarlet and stammered, "I'm sorry."

Harry grabbed her and said, "Hey what's the problem? We are betrothed so you are allowed to kiss me and I certainly don't mind, let me prove it." He pulled her gently into his arms and started to kiss her, Susan instantly responded, putting her arms around his neck and kissing him back with enthusiasm.

The room had gone absolutely silent and into it Susan said, "What's the problem? We are betrothed so we are allowed to kiss and I can tell you all that it was wonderful."

Harry wondered what was going to happen but at that moment Jemma arrived and said, "Yours dinner is ready."

Hermione walked over to Harry and took his hand, she stretched over to kiss his cheek and whispered, "What you did for Susan was very nice." She continued out loud, "You will have to show us the way Jemma, I think that we will all need a guided tour of the house after dinner."

Molly exclaimed, "Poor Ron! I've forgotten his dinner."

Lavender started giggling, "He will think that the world has ended." All who knew Ron were chuckling.

"We can bring him." Jemma said as she clicked her fingers, two elves arrive one each side of Molly and all three disappeared.

Both Hermione and Susan, who had hold of Harry's other hand, felt him start to panic but Susan said quietly, "It's alright Harry house elves do that sort of thing, they will be back in a minute or two with Ron."

The family dining room was next door to the room they had been in so they reached it very quickly and Jemma would not allow Harry to sit in the middle of one side of the table. She led him to the head of the table and sat him with Hermione next to him and then she told him in no uncertain terms that that was where the master and mistress always sat.

Harry started giggling, Hermione was surprised and asked what the matter was and he told her that Jemma had poked her tongue out at him after she had told him off.

Just as everyone had settled down Ron arrived with his mother and he had a black eye. There were two places free, one was between his father and Lavender, which was bad, but the other was the other side of his dad between him and Lavender's mother.

He was so dead.

Then he saw ranged around the far end of the table Ginny, Daphne, Hermione, Harry Susan, Padma and Luna and of course Luna asked, "Where did you get your black eye Ronald?"

Now he was in his worst nightmare, "You will sit down and apologise." His mum said, sitting between her husband and Mrs. Brown, "Oh and I gave him the black eye because of his deplorable behaviour."

Hannah came to his and Lavender's aid making light of the whole matter by saying to Ron, "Six of the most attractive witches at Hogwarts are, thanks to Harry's dad, off the market. So you had better try to get back into Lavender's good books or you will be left with Eloise Midgen." Ron's uncharitable statement about the spotty Hufflepuff had done the rounds of all of the girls in the school, not enhancing his reputation at all.

The tension having been broken everyone started chatting as the elves started bringing in mountains of delicious food.

"It looks like a party." Ron said.

He was quickly answered by Jemma, "Today is Master Harry's birthday and if we is having more time we is having a big party in the party room."

XxX

When they had nearly finished desert Harry surprised Hermione by saying to her quite loudly, "I don't much care what the mothers union decide I am going to marry you first."

This plunged the room into absolute silence and Hermione kissed him, then said, "But I always fancied a big white wedding."

"I think that big white weddings are out at the moment, advertising any of our relationships would be foolish, so after Voldemort is dead then you can all have exactly what you want." Remus and Tonks were looking at him admiringly.

"I heard Ginny's birthday August the eleventh being bandied about for the betrothal wedding date, so how quickly can Hermione and I get married? And who can marry us?"

"If I might be permitted to answer that?" queried Mark Abbot who was Hannah's father. "The second question first, any full member of the Wizengamot can marry you and I am a full member. Now to answer the first question, provided you both want to get married, are of age and have at least two witnesses it takes about a minute and a half."

There was a flash of golden light and a burst of phoenix song as Eros the snow-white phoenix dropped a pair of wedding rings on to the table in front of them before disappearing.

Stunned silence reigned for three minutes and Jane Granger said, "I suppose that that says it all, if the god of love drops a wedding ring in front of you, you had better get on with it."

"I wonder," mused "if there is any recorded instance of Eros calling on the same couple twice?"

Hermione and Harry sat looking into each other's eyes for about five minutes and at the same time they both said, "Yes we will do this now."

Harry asked, "Does this have to be registered straight away?"

Mark smiled, "Again there is a loophole because Hermione is Muggle born then it will not be registered automatically, I am expected to register it manually. However I am given six months to remember to do it and if I forget I only get fined one Galleon a month, so we can hold off as long as you like. But I could put it in at the same time as the other five go in, it could well remain relatively well hidden."

The couple stood up and Jemma said, "We should go to the inner hall, it is where your parents were marrying."

Hermione was stood before Mark beside her mother and father Harry was beside her with Ron, Tonks and Remus.

"Do you want the long version or the short version?" Mark asked.

Harry looked at Hermione and she said, "It has been a long day so we will have the short version, we will probably do this again, twice and we can have the long version then if we want it."

"Harry James Potter do you wish to take Hermione Jane Granger as your wife?" Mark asked.

"I do." Harry replied.

"Hermione Jane Granger do you wish to take Harry James Potter as your husband?" Mark asked.

"I do." Hermione replied.

Mark smiled, "By the power invested in me by the Wizengamot I pronounce you man and wife and Harry you may kiss Mrs. Potter."

As Harry kissed her a huge cheer went up led by over thirty house elves who had come from all of the Potter properties, these weren't all of his elves but most of them were there.

The party had been going on for about an hour and the newly weds wanted to go to bed but Harry was the master of the house and as such he had work to do.

"Remus, Tonks," Harry asked, "Kingsley is coming to number twelve in the morning so are you staying here or are you going back to Grimmauld Place?"

When they decided that they would return to Grimmauld Place Harry took them to the entry hall and security cleared the Floo for their use and said that one of them should come and get him when Kingsley arrived in the morning. He also went with one of the elves to his room to collect all of his belongings and have them all brought back to Fairy Hill House.

Some of the Elves took one member of each family home to collect a few days clothes for their family, although it appeared that all of his betrothed had decided to bring all of their things to the house.

Jemma decided that the best route for showing everyone to their bedrooms was by going up the back stairs because if they came back down that way the family dining room would be virtually straight in front of them for their breakfast. They had all been assured that the elves would make themselves generally available as guides for the next few days.

The families of all of Harry's betrothed were allocated permanent rooms, including Parvati and Ron. Ron and the girls were also told that if they left their rooms in the night they would set off the house alarms. Lavender looked relieved but Ron looked resigned, they had all heard her tell him that there would be nothing more than kissing until they were married.

Showing the five betrothed girls to bed and kissing them goodnight must have been something quite unique in human relations, especially having his new wife stood nearby. Three of the girls he had never kissed before, in fact the three girls in question had never kissed any boy before. Therefore it was all quite clumsy but being as the other five insisted on standing watching and cheering them on it became hilarious. Eventually Hermione assured all of them that she would set up a practise roster and because of her deadpan face this produced more laughter and giggling which she joined in.

Eventually everyone was settled in his or her room.

So, after his 'quiet' day, it was time for Harry and Hermione to go to bed.

**FiN**

**Authors Note**: This is the first thing I have been able to write for quite some time and I hope that it meets with your approval. So…**PLEASE REVIEW**.


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